


what others do with their gifts

by bloodonmytypewriterkeys



Series: like a pair of open graves [3]
Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Animal Death, Blood, Blow Jobs, Bondage, Corvo Dancing, Daud Spying, Hand Jobs, I cannot overstress how much I am writing Daud as painsexual, M/M, Masochism, PWP, Porn with Feelings, Using powers for things the outsider didn't intend, animal blood but idk if thats better or worse, but like. still mostly porn, hmm i regret putting those words together, like in a way that is both graphic and sexual, the Feelings are slowly emerging
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2019-12-07 02:28:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18228683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bloodonmytypewriterkeys/pseuds/bloodonmytypewriterkeys
Summary: "Fascinating what others do with their gifts. I'd say we're much more practical," says a Whaler. If only they knew what Daud and Corvo did with theirs.A chapter of smut for each active power that Corvo and Daud have.





	1. Bend Time

Corvo's hands seem to occupy his every moment. Not, of course, that he doesn't love the ass and the thick thighs and the broad shoulders, the taste of his hole, of his cock, the way their mouths work together. All addictive, but Corvo's _hands_. 

Maybe it's the mark. That focal point for the magic that connects them. He can feel it at times like a physical link, like the void behind Corvo's mark is right next to the void behind Daud's. Where the image comes from he doesn't know, but it's so clear he swears he could reach through his own skin and touch Corvo from the inside.

Then again, maybe there's a simpler explanation.

Maybe it's the fact that Corvo's thick, strong, clever fingers fuck him relentlessly. Corvo treats Daud's ass like tight reins on a wild horse.  He presses every advantage, he abuses his power here. Presses in painfully hard, with three fingers, four fingers, his knuckles testing Daud's limits. It's enough to make him want Corvo's fist: it couldn't hurt more than other things they've done. But right now just Corvo's brutal fingers are enough, moving inside him like he means to just beat the come out of Daud.

It's not, Daud realises, his marked hand.

The realisation may be catalysed by a hand beside his face, where he's pressed into the floor. So close to him Corvo's thumb smears the line of spit Daud's open mouth has left in its wake. He worries for a moment that it will be enough to repulse Corvo, to maybe slow the brutal fuck of his fingers, but they've both been much more repulsive than that. 

(Really, it surprises him they aren't worse. By now they're both used to the stench of sewers, so why avoid one of the only boundaries left for them to cross? Rich men at the Cat pay good money for the Golden Special and similar. He doesn't know why, but he doesn't care why not.)

Daud fumbles a hand over Corvo's - marked hand over mark - with every intent of dragging it to his mouth. He wants to trace the lines with his tongue, to see if it tastes like whale oil or ink.

Corvo's hand jerks against the touch,  a simple started reflex. 

A flex of both their hands moving together, and all the colour in the world is sucked into their joined hands.

Time doesn't slow for him. Corvo's powers don't work on him like that.

But he has always noticed, when he abuses time this way, that there is a price. Time might bend in places but this isn't the void, he isn't outside of it here. When time resumes it hits him with the force of a train cart and he can already see what's going to happen. Already knows what's coming.

"Harder," he grunts. Orders, if he can. "Fuck me, Corvo-"

Corvo obeys, his fingers working with fresh enthusiasm, dragging groans out of Daud's chest, bypassing his brain entirely. He's pushing himself back on Corvo's hand, lifting his hips so high that his cock only brushes the ground with each thrust. It's not really pleasant, the feeling of timbers against the sensitive head of his prick, but he's leaving smears of precome all the same.

Every inch of tension and discomfort and rocking waves of pleasure through his body draws down into his groin, but it's muffled somehow by the slowness of time. He's more aware than ever of the simple slide of skin, the way Corvo's thumb strokes over his tailbone, the almost inaudible noises of pleasure Corvo makes. Corvo _enjoys_  finger fucking him. 

He knew Corvo liked fucking him, liked the blowjobs and the violence - but those things were _interesting_. 

It had never occurred to him that Corvo might like giving Daud this. Watching him writhe and moan and fuck himself on Corvo's fingers. The simple pleasure of making someone lose themselves. Of making Daud lose himself-

And then he's coming, feeling nothing but tight pleasure and Corvo's fingers inside him and Corvo's hand over his as their marks fade.

When the power stops, Daud loses all sense of time. 

He is frozen strung out on pleasure, orgasm running through him.

And then time slams back into place and his internal organs just melt out of his cock, come gushing out of him in a river of what he imagines must be blood and gore. His whole fucking body must be coming out in this puddle on the floor and whatever words or noises he's spewing he couldn't say.

When time resumes its normal capacity, he's lying in his own wet mess and his ass aches and he can see Corvo kneeling beside him, one thumb resting on Daud's parted lips.

He pulls away in silence when Daud opens his eyes. "We've been wasting our powers," Daud manages to groan. "You- you should try that."

"Later," Corvo says, with nearly a smile. 

He's right. He's damned well earned a reward, and Daud puts aside his boneless satisfaction and sits up, wetting his lips. Ready for Corvo's cock.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: This chapter was loosely inspired by a scene in Manna Francis' The Administration Series, which you can read here: http://www.mannazone.org/zone/admin/index.html You'll know the scene when you get to it.


	2. Void Gaze

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter involves graphic, sexual description of Corvo eating a rat. So like, sorry, and maybe just wait for the next chapter if that seems too gross for you.

Sneaking around the palace isn't really a defensible action. Sneaking _into_  the palace, sure: that just means he's horny and it's not quite the right time of night to go looking for Corvo on rooftops. But normally he takes a direct route up to Corvo's balcony. In an act that Daud has taken as an open invitation, Corvo had some of the barred windows between him and the ground opened up, making those rooms easy stopping points for Daud on the way up the wall. The route is only accessible to the two of them.

Or the Whalers, he supposes, but they never come here now. None of them are comfortable with Corvo's ability to track them where others cannot. It probably doesn't help that Corvo wove his way through the flooded district, leaving a trail of unconscious bodies in his wake. So shortly after the overseers had come through killing them, it had shaken up any sense of security they still had with Daud. More had left after that, presumably already on the fence before Corvo tipped the balance. Daud understood those who left better than those who remained.

Sneaking into the room adjoining Corvo's without alerting him is no mean feat, especially considering that Corvo would only have to glance through the walls to see him. Somehow he doubts his success would convince the people who think he's gone soft.

Maybe he has gone soft, because-

In the grey-scale world of his void gaze, Corvo is a yellow silhouette like everyone else. Right now, there is no light showing his line of sight: his eyes are shut as he stands in the middle of the room, listening to the audiograph that plays. Its sound is muffled through the wall, but Daud thinks he'd recognise it with the whole tower between them.

Some things learned early never leave you.

His mother sang to him often. When they were in Cullero, she sang about sailors drowning or freezing in the inky sea. In Karnaca she sang about a girl disappearing down the silver mines and turning into a monster. But more than any other song she sang about a boy born in the month of darkness. Daud had never known why she sang about it. He was born in the month of ice and his mother lived, obviously. 

Hearing those strained strings now, his heart nearly stopped in his chest. A voice not his mother's singing  _And lo! he went into the void,_ but still so achingly familiar. Full of the smell of her and the warmth of Serkonan nights and the crash of the sea. (Why did Corvo make him think so much about his mother? That seemed like something a natural philosopher could find unpleasant meaning in.)

Corvo hasn't heard him yet, despite the audible pounding of Daud's heart. And then, making silence nearly impossible, Corvo raises his hands in a recognisable waltz position and begins to sway, his feet finding the steps even blind in that tiny room.

The fact that Corvo doesn't hear Daud then is almost disturbing. Surely by now just his breath must be loud enough to hear over the music. He can hear his teeth grinding together as his jaw clenches, and there's a sudden need to swallow that he doesn't care to examine.

 _Born in the Month of Darkness_  is not a very fast or catchy song. It's not like the orchestral allegros of Dunwall's parties or the faster, cheerier music that floated out of bars Karnaca. It wasn't for dancing really. But young as he'd been when he left the island, he knew Serkonos never wrote a song that wasn't for dancing to. Corvo- Corvo had been older, had lived longer there, and mixed with a different crowd. Even with that sinister tune playing, his movements were confident and sensual. His hips moved in a way Daud hadn't seen outside of sex, his hands floated in the air like they were carried on a breeze, his feet moved like a fencer's. 

The desire to see - _actually_ see, in beautiful colour and texture and detail - is reaching a breaking point. He's just thinking maybe he could sneak out the window and around to the balcony to catch a glimpse before Corvo noticed him, when Corvo stops.

Daud's heart  is in his mouth, a  transversal ready on his fingertips, but Corvo turns his gaze to the ground and Daud sees it, too. Rats. Not a swarm of them, though the plague is not so distant that such things are unheard of, but still rats. The plague is enough to give anyone a shiver at the sight of rats, but Corvo reaches out for one. The strange thing doesn't even wriggle in his hands, just lets itself be picked up, carried away from its fellows and the protection of the swarm.

Corvo raises the rat to face level, like he's trying to see it better. Maybe there's something interesting about this rat that Daud can't see through the walls, and this isn't just some weird quirk of Corvo's.

And then Corvo pushes the live rat head-first into his mouth and bites it in half with an audible crunch.

Daud has seen many disgusting things in his life, but he was not prepared for _that_. He recoils automatically, and maybe, between the wall and the music, a lesser man might not have noticed the sound.

Corvo notices, and turns to stare through the wall at Daud with half a rat still in one hand. He eats the remainder the same way, just watching Daud watching him. Then beckons. Daud imagines he might be smirking, but he obeys. 

When he comes through from the balcony, the song has finished and the rats have dispersed, but Corvo holds one last in his hand. A white rat, not resisting the hold at all, so still it could be dead. It isn't. 

There's a lot that Daud could say. He could talk about the dancing, about Serkonos, about their powers, about the presence of rats in the room, about the sex he came here for. About Corvo's snack. But he stands and says nothing until Corvo hands him the rat. "I'm not going to eat it," he says preemptively.

Corvo just gives him a look, the hint of a laugh in his eyes, and steps back. The rat immediately jerks around, writhing so hard in Daud's hand that he nearly crushes it in an attempt to hold on. It's a long embarrassing second before he has grip enough to snap its neck.

This doesn't appear to put any kink in Corvo's plan. (If dead and live rats are equal, Daud shudders to imagine why Corvo eats them alive.) He just goes over to the audiograph and plays a new song. Something Daud doesn't know, though it's still obviously Serkonan. Maybe Corvo's feeling homesick.

Then Corvo turns back to him, hips just barely moving with the music, and begins to unbutton his top. It's stupid but Daud's mouth goes dry at the sight. It's the way Corvo is looking at him, _performing_ for him. 

Or maybe it's the fact that Corvo smiles suddenly, actually smiles, and his teeth are bloody. He peels off his shirt and throws it to a chair, and approaches Daud with the hint of a dance in his step.

Daud doesn't know any dances, panics, but Corvo just takes the rat from his hand. He continues to sway his hips as he strokes the rat, smoothing down its fur. Then he holds it between his hands and bends it, makes the bones crunch and crack as its spine breaks. The sound makes something jolt in Daud's stomach, a sense of disgust he thought he'd long since destroyed. There's a chance he might actually be sick, and-

Oh yep, there Corvo goes: tearing the rat clean in half between his hands. 

The sight of a crushed rat is already familiar to anyone in Dunwall. It's bloody but it's not as bad as what Daud knows is coming. 

He's torn between wishing Corvo would get it over with and _wanting_ , because Corvo knows how to make him desperate. 

(Daud has a scar on his hip, still fresh and pink, and he can't think about it without feeling a rush of warmth at the memory. There's something about knowing that Corvo wanted him to enjoy it, and he did, and no one else would have. No one else could have made him so angry and fought him so hard and wanted him so badly.)

"Go on," Corvo says - dares him, really. Hands half back to Daud and gives him that wildman grin. Lifts his own half to his mouth by the long, pink tail and reaches out to touch it with his tongue.

 _Enough_ , Daud thinks. 

He's not going to eat the bloody rat. He's eaten worse by far but he's not eating half a rat just to entertain Corvo. He has other ways of getting what he wants.

So he blinks behind Corvo and grabs him in a chokehold. There's a moment when Corvo steps a leg to the side, starting to defend, but Daud pulls him back a little tighter and whispers, "Stay still." It's enough to stop the instinctive struggle that Daud knows is so hard to fight. Once Corvo is still, Daud adjusts his grip so the hold is one-handed. It's not as secure but he needs a hand free, needs to touch Corvo now.

He pulls Corvo back against him, ass to cock, and winds a leg over Corvo's ankle to hold that position. Another precarious hold but Corvo's not fighting him. Daud rests his head on Corvo's shoulder and reaches up to take the rat from Corvo's hand, still holding it above his mouth. "Go on," he says. Corvo's mouth opens readily for him. Just a little squeeze of the rat's soft body and blood dribbles out, dripping blood over Corvo's mouth and face in messy streaks. "Use your tongue," Daud orders him.

The sight of that tongue reaching up to a dangling treat has him grinding helplessly against Corvo's ass. Corvo has a long tongue but still the tip barely reaches the rat's dangling meat. He is rewarded with only a drip of blood. Red sliding down the pink of his tongue, spreading out like ink on water. Daud presses his cock against the crease of Corvo's ass, as much as he can with their pants in the way. 

A strangled noise leaves Corvo's throat but it's hard to say anything clearly with your tongue out like that. The sound is almost a choke.

Daud lowers the rat enough that Corvo can snatch it between his teeth like a wolfhound, but he doesn't let go as Corvo bites down. 

Instead, he pushes the rat further, forcing meat and fur and tiny little bones into Corvo's mouth faster than he can eat them. Between that and the hold on his throat, Corvo can barely breathe, and there is drool and blood running down the sides of his mouth. If Daud had a free hand he'd be in Corvo's ass by now and the jerking of Corvo's hips suggest he feels the same. "This is disgusting," Daud says, hot and wet against Corvo's ear. "You could have anything you want. You could be filling up on figs and fine bread, you could be fucking anyone. You could stop me any time you liked, but here you are, choking on a dead rat and getting off on it." There's not much left now of Corvo's half and Daud had abandoned his on the floor, so he pushes his fingers in Corvo's mouth instead. "You want to taste blood, Corvo? Or do you just want to choke on what I give you?" He pushes his fingers further in, fucking Corvo's mouth with them so hard and deep that Corvo gags and that's- that's more than either of them can take.

It's barely seconds before they are both free, shoving their pants down to their boots, and Corvo drops to his knees. Takes Daud's cock down deep enough to gag on it and just keeps going, keeps gagging until there's tears and drool everywhere. He mewls like a kitten when Daud grabs his hair and fucks his throat - hot and wet and tight, and still choking on him, muscles convulsing around his thrusts. He comes listening to the sound of Corvo choking. So hard he nearly blacks out, and is left just leaning over Corvo and panting, feeling sweat drip down his neck and back.

"Please," Corvo chokes out, his voice wrecked.

Daud looks down to see Corvo's mouth a pink wet mess and his cock nearly purple, glistening with precome. He kneels, takes Corvo's cock in his hand and jacks him off with lazy strokes now that his own desperate need is sated. Puts his other hand on Corvo's lower back and pressed them closer together,  close enough that Corvo can sink his teeth into Daud's shoulder and moan as he bites down.

"Look at you," he mutters, stroking Corvo's skin. "Perfect." They're just words tumbling out of his mouth in the wake of orgasm. Satisfaction is not something he's used to fighting. "Perfect," he says again, and Corvo comes, biting down so hard he draws blood.


	3. Pull

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updates might continue to be kinda sparse but this is still ongoing. I'm just finishing a degree rn, but your comments are giving me life in this dark time.

"Stop fidgeting," Daud growled, somewhat muffled by the thumb in his mouth. Corvo's hands followed Daud even when he pulled away from sucking cock for three damned seconds. Not that he was complaining about _that_. Sucking cock with Corvo's thumb in the corner of his mouth, smearing spit everywhere, tingling with the faintest taste-smell of Void, he'd find some way to live with that particular torture, if he really had to.

But Corvo, damn the man to the void, kept clawing at his head like there'd be hair enough to hold on to. Corvo's big, restless hands apparently didn't know what to do without a full head of long black hair. Short nails scrape Daud's scalp in a way he just can't find arousing, drawing his attention away and away again from the weight of Corvo's cock on his tongue.

He just wants to suck Corvo slowly off. Wants to enjoy the tickle of precome down his throat for as long as he can, wants to feel as much as he can, get his tongue under Corvo's foreskin and along his slit, get his lips around the base of him, wants to keep Corvo here until he breaks. Really he wants Corvo to fuck his throat so hard it leaves both of them mute. 

And he can't do that if he's distracted every thirty seconds by another scratch on his scalp.

Corvo's hands move to his shoulders but Daud has no sooner returned to the task than Corvo's hands are back on his head. Not yet scratching at him, one hand wandering close to Daud's ear and that's- Void, even as a _boy_  he wouldn't let anyone grip him like that. Of course, as a boy he'd had more hair.

He pushes down, feels Corvo's cock choke him for a second and lets himself gag, all spit and mess in a way that makes them both moan. The bitter taste in the back of his mouth, the shallow thrust of his hips, even the eye-watery snotty feeling of gagging, it makes him so-

"Damn you!" he snarls, pulling back and raising a hand to see if this most recent scratch drew blood. "Cut your cursed nails, Corvo!" Looking up into a smirk, Daud can't tell if Corvo is doing this on purpose or just laughing at his expense. Surely he can't enjoy having this fucking blowjob interrupted every thirty seconds.

Daud's cock is so hard it hurts and he hasn't even touched it and he just wants Corvo to stay. fucking. still. It's not in the man's nature, not for a second. 

Almost without even thinking about it, Daud tenses his marked hand and _pulls_  Corvo into the air, paralysed. There's a yelp of surprise, maybe protest, but fuck him. He should have listened. And when Daud sinks his teeth into Corvo's thigh the noise he makes is only pleasure.

It's such a vindictive delight to push himself down on Corvo's cock and swallow him to the base, knowing that Corvo can't do _anything_.

He's done harder things while tethering someone in the air, and keeping his attention on Corvo is no hard feat, so he's humming with self-satisfaction as he fucks his own throat on Corvo's cock. Spit is running freely down his chin, smeared on Corvo's thighs. There's more and more precome in his mouth, so he slows down. Makes it take longer and longer even as Corvo groans. When Corvo's making desperate noises that say he's _this_  close, needs just a little bit nudge over the edge, Daud pulls back to admire him.

It seems unlikely that he could stand up without dropping Corvo, but he has one hand free and his mouth is at a perfect level for many things. He curls his free hand around Corvo's ankle and bends to kiss it, nipping the sensitive skin and feeling the jerk of muscle muffled by his magic. Sensitive. He bends down some more to dart his tongue between Corvo's toe, for once without the chance of being kicked in the face, and listens to the snort of almost-laughter above him.

How often does Corvo laugh, he wonders. Daud can imagine that Emily would make him laugh, but from what he has seen the girl is as much a source of concern as she is of joy. Last week she had two old, condemned ships crashed together on the river. No one on board, but he didn't imagine that was her idea.

Is that why Corvo stopped killing?

They don't have these kinds of conversations, but sometimes there's a quiet that comes close.

Corvo makes another sound of protest, his muscles straining against the magic, and Daud snorts at him and returns to his teasing. He kisses Corvo's thighs, skin and muscle twitching beneath his mouth, free hand roaming Corvo's ass and squeezing fingertip bruises into the muscle. Void - that ass. That _ass_.  Daud moans into Corvo's thighs, just thinking about that ass. The second he's got Corvo off, he's going to be coming desperately in his own hand. One or both  of them should be tired of this by now but it's just getting better. Every time he tastes Corvo's cock or feels that tight hot body around him, every time he learns a new sound or recognises a familiar one, every time they bite into each other's mouth it feels better.

He wraps his lips around the head of Corvo's cock, sliding his tongue along the slit and back down beneath it, sucking and moaning and  doing everything he can to make this unbearable. He's done teasing, he just wants Corvo's cum now. Wants to hear him-

"Fuck," Corvo chokes out, body straining against the tethering hold him in place, muscles working so hard he manages a shallow thrust in Daud's mouth. " _Daud_."

Hear him just like that, exactly like that.

Daud swallows down Corvo's cock, lets himself gag and choke and drool, fucks his throat like that's what it was made for. His own groans are muffled by Corvo in his mouth but he can feel them vibrating through his chest and then Corvo comes. A cut off cry. No hands in his hair, for once, and the taste spread over his tongue and mouth as he pulls back to release Corvo's slowly softening cock.

He gives Corvo a second to recover before releasing him, but Corvo still stumbles, rights himself with a hand on Daud's shoulder. Daud's wrapping a hand around his cock when Corvo growls, "No." Their eyes meet when Daud looks up, and Corvo's face is red with exertion, sweat beading in his hairline. He looks how Daud feels. "Hands and knees," Corvo orders him. "You're going to come on my tongue."

Daud can't deny Corvo anything.


	4. Windblast

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Our semi-regular porning is interrupted by something resembling a plot. And this is now half way done!

Corvo looked him in the eye with as much malice as any man could put in a look and growled, "Fuck yourself."

Such a pleasant demand under other circumstances. More normal circumstances. Not that it was a regular request, but he'd be happy enough to fuck himself on his own fingers while Corvo watched, to deny them both what they wanted until they were aching need for each other. 

Not a useful train of thought but it's more familiar territory than he's currently in. "Save your breath," he snaps. "I'm not telling you anything you don't already know. You have to do something-"

"Don't tell me how to-" Corvo's voice cuts off, whether from emotion or the pain of yelling. He's hoarser when he continues, "If you hadn't killed her mother-"

"I forced your hand, did I?"  Oh- he's not yelling, he doesn't yell. If he were going to yell at anyone in all his life it would have been Lurk, not Corvo fucking Attano.  But he's so close, so angry, angrier than he should be. "You think that little girl wouldn't see you cutting a path to her enemies? Killing as many men in six months as I've killed in a lifetime? You want to develop a conscience now, you deal with it. Deal with _her_." 

If the ships hadn't made it obvious, the city was now realising that their new empress was not her mother's copy. Maybe having your mother stabbed to death in front of you didn't encourage you to follow in her footsteps. Jessamine was loved and she died, Corvo was feared and he lived, and maybe that was the lesson she absorbed. Maybe Daud had failed when he dealt with Delilah, and this was all her doing. Didn't seem likely. He didn't picture Delilah playing tea time while she had a country at her fingertips.

But the executions might be her style. 

So many executions lined up, and little Emily Kaldwin the First stood firm on the issue. Not parliament or the regent himself could pardon a man without the Empress' say so. Death row wasn't much different from the firing squad, only slower. The men currently waiting there for obeying their orders - trying to arrest a masked vigilante, or not revealing what they knew about the spymaster's crimes - weren't likely to get the same assistance in their escape as Corvo did.

If it were just that- well, an empress was entitled to justice, even if she was a child. He wasn't yet enough of a hypocrite to say a young girl couldn't kill for justice or revenge.  

It was the boats crashing into each other on the river, the wild animals brought from the far continent, the walls of light not yet taken down, the tall boys still in training on the island, and the paranoia of parliament left to run wild. It was the complete lack of control. "Corvo, all the children in  _my_ life grew up to be assassins, and they weren't as bad as her! Not even Billie-" too much, too many words, too much revealed. They'd known that name when they were looking for. Daud had recognised it, once she told him her real name, and Corvo had been here by then, and-

\- and Corvo couldn't hurt Billie even if he wanted to, because she was gone. An old fear just rearing its ugly head.

"She's not one of your rats," Corvo growled, reaching out one hand to shove Daud's chest. Childish bravado, not what he expected, not when they could do so much real damage to each other. "I'm handling it."

"If you were handling it we wouldn't be having this argument." Resisted the urge to shove Corvo back, resisted the urge to just stab him. "I came here to fuck, not tell you how to do your damn job."

Corvo's hand clamped on his wrist, bruising hard, and they both fought back the flush of heat that made them feel. "I didn't ask your advice. I don't have anyone I need to beg, so I don't much need your expertise."

Daud broke free automatically, feeling anger flood him like it hadn't in years. How Corvo had the power to make him so angry was a secondary concern. Much more important was punching Corvo in his smug fucking face, feeling fist connect with lip connect with teeth, feeling the split of flesh and the warm wet blood. Doesn't say anything, because every stupid angry thing he thinks would take too long and he wants to hurt Corvo right. now. 

It's probably better that way. Thinking of the empress' dying body, the little girl's screams, the sight of a twice-betrayed Corvo lying near dead in the flooded district, the sound of Corvo gasping when he can no longer beg - he could hurt Corvo much worse with words than he will with his fist.

He's just pulled back his fist for a second blow, watching Corvo for a reaction, when the thrust of a hand and the sudden gust of wind knocks him back into the wall. Corvo is on him before he can catch his breath, before he can think, and a fist in his stomach leaving him gasping out what little air he has. Instinct has him stomp a foot down on Corvo's, earning him a grunt of pain, but then Corvo is on him. 

The kiss tastes like blood. 

So many of their kisses taste like blood. He's used to it. He likes it, really, likes that kissing Corvo doesn't taste like kissing anyone else. And right now he's glad it must hurt Corvo to kiss him, because he wasn't done with this argument. This matters. He spared Corvo and saved Emily, even if he damned them just as much, and it can't all be for nothing. All Corvo's killing can't be for nothing, for the empire to be as damned as it would have been by Burrows.

His head is spinning with want of air by the time they break apart, but he only sucks in one breath of air before he's curling a hand in Corvo's hair and pulling him back to the kiss. Vaguely he wishes there was some way to make the kiss punitive, to kiss Corvo so fiercely and deeply that it was understood as a punishment. Too bad they already kiss like that.

They kiss so much. They should fuck each other without kisses, with only bites and curses and clawing hands, but somehow they never seem to stop. Even now- he's so angry but all he can do about it is dig his teeth into Corvo's split lip and enjoy the moan that earns him. That moan burns through his whole body.

When they finally break apart, they stay so close that spit trails between their lips, still connecting them. "We've wasted too much time," he says, lips brushing together. Corvo pulls back a fraction, looks at him with wide, startled eyes. Like he said something he wasn't meant to say out loud. "So make it quick," Daud adds, already shoving his hand down Corvo's pants.

They grind into each other, limbs tangling at weird angles, pressed into the wall, grunts and moans muffled as they continue to kiss. Corvo's hand on Daud's cock is more familiar than his own, and it feels so fucking good. Corvo knows exactly what will tip him over the edge, so breaks their kiss long enough to spit in his own hand. The sight and sound of it is as fucking unbearable as the return of wet, slick touch. Corvo panting in his ear, maybe saying something that is tangled between breaths and moans, before just biting down on Daud's throat. 

For once, Daud's anger doesn't quite disappear when he comes, but it still feels too good to bear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You ever think about the fact that Corvo worked for Theodanis Abele and probably was very aware of the search for his son's killer, little baby Billie Lurk.


	5. Overseers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An interlude of sorts. Daud spends some time actually working. Everyone's tensions are high. There are overseers.
> 
> (I'm hoping to get some more chapters out while it's Nano. Anything to avoid writing my actual novel.)

Not killing people turns out to be a lot harder than he thought. 

Outsider's balls, it's not like he's never had to bring anyone in alive before. Not normally what assassins are hired for, but he was never picky. As long as he got paid, he'd kill or kidnap anyone. Clearly.

But killing no one, getting through the job with cleaner hands, turned out to be a pain in the arse. He's been watching the Brimsley house for days. It's a good house, and the Brimsleys are proof that money and paranoia go hand in hand. There are no arc pylons, here or anywhere else. Perhaps he has the blasted regent to thank for that, but he hasn't asked. 

They emphatically _haven't_ been avoiding each other. It turns out they don't need to avoid each other, since they go none of the same places. Corvo's presence is enough to put an end to most jobs in the palace, and the few that remain would be petty thievery. They haven't stooped that low yet.

Guard changes shift according to schedule. From across the chasm between buildings, Thomas looks at him, the way he did as a child. 

(Thomas looks at everything, and worries, and keeps his thoughts to himself. In another life he'd have been an overseer.)

Overseers are the exact problem.

He's been here, spent three damned days haunting roofs and kicking rats off in his sleep and feeling every minute of it in his bones, because of the overseers. The most recent Lord Brimsley is a sponsor of High Overseer Khulan. Neither man can stand the other but that means nothing. Associating with the High Overseer absolves this Brimsley of any suspicion of black magic, and not even the regent can make a man High Overseer without some political lubrication. 

Overseer connections and money and paranoia mean the Brimsley house is a nest of overseers. 

One of the men on Music Box shift puts it down on the top balcony to take a break while he patrols the halls. The others with their heavy loads haven't had the smart idea yet. It's George coming on shift now, but he isn't tired yet. A couple of hours to go before they have their weak point for entry, and Daud feels every minute like a year on his face.

He smokes every last cigarette he can find in his pockets, down to burned fingers like he's a street kid again. Finally he settles in against a chimney stack and simply waits, eyes relaxed on the building. Only occasionally using void gaze to watch the patrols, to be sure things are going as expected.

There - George on the balcony, unstrapping the music box.

Daud signals Thomas and the whalers keeping watch. Petro on the north end of the street, Finn on the south. Finn at least will be useful if they need extra hands in the building. 

Thomas blinks onto the Brimsleys' roof and drops like a cat behind the overseer. Daud can feel the sudden spike of rage rolling off Thomas as he wraps his arm around George's throat. Not something Thomas normally feels, and he doesn't have time to wonder what that means before Thomas lets go of the still-conscious overseer, throwing him to the floor. 

The time it takes to blink over there is too much time. Thomas' anger is only flaring as he kicks the man, and the cry of pain is enough to make Daud flinch. A careless mistake. Hibernating anger that neither of them saw, and now the sound of footsteps rushing towards them. 

Daud grabs Thomas' arm and shoves him to the door, both drawing pistols. He could never give up carrying one, much less ask his men to. It's only a symbol: they don't need tools to kill people.

He fires to miss, to distract the man who rushes in, and then Thomas cocks his gun like he means it. Daud stops time and calmly chokes the new man out, leaving him on the ground. When time restarts, no shot fires, so he supposes Thomas was just bluffing. Daud wouldn't hold it again him either way - but after a second he realises the gun is shaking. Just a tremor as he lowers it, the trembling of Thomas' hands mostly hidden by his gloves.

Novices are often angry like this, unable to control it long enough to stake out a house for five minutes. Even worse when the house holds some meaning to them: rich houses or happy families, or the wretched poor who remind them of themselves. Sometimes they're angry for reasons he doesn't understand and doesn't care to. If they want to talk it out they can find a girl to pay for her time, that's not what he's offering. 

But he knew when he recruited the first of them that he was sharing more than his power. The Whalers are more than street kids with magic. 

He moves leisurely to Thomas' side, takes the gun from his trembling hand. There's no resistance, though Thomas' fingers tighten on his hand when he moves to pull away. Daud allows the touch. "You can still kill him. Just do it quietly."

Thomas' grip tightens on his hand, and then he moves so fast most men wouldn't have a choice about going along with him. His mask is off, and he looks and smells like a man that has spent the last few days in a Whaler's mask, but he has no problem shoving Daud into the wall and only stops when they're an inch apart. 

Before, Daud would have thrown him to the floor and put a knife to his neck. Now, he waits. 

It's not a purely altruistic decision. He hasn't seen Corvo in some time, and apparently that's not the same as the previous forty-two years he'd spent _not_  fucking Corvo's brains out. Thomas' breath is hot on his face but his eyes are glazed over, like he's not here. 

Daud waits. He is nothing if not patient. Their hands are still together, Thomas caught somewhere between clinging to him and pinning him there. With all the layers between them, Daud can't feel any reactions in Thomas' body, but he can feel his own prick slowly reacting to the body so close to him.

The grip loosens and Thomas moves a little without stepping back. He looks away, down the hall, clearly still struggling to know what to do. He is not a man used to unbridled emotion, but he is a man. It's a mistake to forget that they are people, each with their own thoughts and reasons for being here, reasons for reacting as they do.

"Who are we working for?" Thomas asks.

Not a question Daud was expecting. There's a lot behind it, a layer for each answer he could give. Daud drops to one knee, hears Thomas' shocked breath, but he only picks up Thomas' forgotten mask and rises to hand it back to him. "You work for me."

It's the right answer. Thomas' shoulders relax, even if his face is full of thought before he puts the mask back on. He looks at the overseers on the ground with some consideration, but in the end he only grabs George by the shoulders and drags him around the corner to hide him. Daud follows with the other body, both still breathing.

"I'll finish here," he tells Thomas. "Check the basement." They had roughly planned to search the house together, but it's not like Daud needs the help. He doubts it's just him who wants some space between the two of them right now.

"Master Daud," Thomas says, and disappears. 

Further evidence of black magic in the Brimsley manor is too much to expect. Daud is already certain there are no runes or bone charms in the house. But there might yet be blackmail material or the other secrets he desires. Some of it he has a buyer in mind for, but his instincts whisper it's more use to him as insurance.

What prompted Thomas' question? The change in their work, the company Daud keeps? Questions about the Outsider, about overseers? Thomas has never questioned him like that before. He's not certain he understood the question, and he knows he doesn't understand the timing. More unanswered questions to distract him from his work, gnawing at him as he moves through the house.

He searches the bedroom and office on his level, turning up some letters that warrant further investigation, and a locket portrait of a woman he suspects has no place here. He takes the lot, and any loose change he finds, but leaves the valuables. No sense alarming his quarry just yet.

The hairs on the back of his neck shiver up as in a cold breeze, and he only has time to snap around and stare through the walls before his ears pick up the first note of music.

His void gaze drops out just as Overseer bloody George comes to the door of the room. Daud wishes Thomas had given the man a more thorough beating, and then he's collapsing to his knees, hands moving automatically to cover his ears. The noise is unbearable. The overseer is speaking, but the words barely make it past the unearthly groaning and metallic squeals. He hears "heretic" and "rites over your corpse" but the noise is so close, so loud, so overwhelming.

It's no wonder that it paralysed Lurk and the others. This close to the box it's worse than he ever thought, like the sound of a drill in his molars. The intermittent rustle that breaks up the groaning is a whisper of steel, words almost legible. It smells like the void.

He can only curl up tighter. Part of him still says to fight, howls like a caged wolfhound smelling blood, but his body only draws up tighter. The overseer is just a pair of boots on the edge of his greying vision, and Daud can't move to draw his knife.

The pain is as deep inside him as Corvo has ever been. As all-consuming as Corvo fucking into the wound he made in Daud's side. But that pain had been white-hot as a grenade going off, but this was as deep and dark and infinite as the void. If he could think at all, he'd laugh at that. This is black magic. If only they knew.

When the sound stops, Daud thinks for a moment he has died.

It doesn't stop him staggering to his feet and drawing his knife, blood roaring in his ears.

This time, the overseer is dead. Thomas is standing over him with his wristbow ready like the man might yet twitch.  

Daud is so drenched in sweat his gloves squelch and, unbelievably, he is hard.

Corvo's words come back to him. That grin, and that threat. "I could summon overseers. Have them play their music box, punish your heresy. I'd watch. I'd get bored before they did, but I'd watch some." People have threatened him with everything imaginable by now, and Corvo's imagination does not run so wild as some. 

But the words summon a sick collision of feelings and memories. Overseers swarming the flood district, and his men being tortured, and all of it Billie Lurk's fault. The heat of remembered rage - and guilt. And Corvo, slinking through the district like a snake when their wounds were so fresh. The fight, the fear. More guilt. 

It hadn't made him hard at the time. A lie imposed on his memories.

He stares at Thomas, and the mask’s glassy eyes stare back at him.

But the sounds of men running up the stairs are more urgent than anything they have to say to each other. "I've found what I need," he says, and forces himself to walk on steady feet to the window, transversing to the roof to escape. He doesn't need to check to know Thomas follows him.


	6. Summon Assassin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Technically no assassins are summoned in this chapter, a sin for which I hope you will forgive me. My creativity is being saved up for "Devouring Swarm."

Enough time passes that Daud's libido begins to adjust to it. There is the occasional crackle of Corvo's voice in some official announcements which stirs him to something between arousal and discomfort, but that is not often. He ignores his cock as much as he can. 

Thomas pretends that nothing ever happened in the Brimsley manor, which is how it should be. One evening when he's certain he won't be caught, Daud finds and reads Thomas' journal, but it contains nothing of interest. Thomas knows better than to write secrets down. Once or twice he catches a moment between Thomas and Kieron, something in their posture suggesting that Thomas is courting a new outlet for those complicated feelings. Daud says nothing: they have learned to treat his indifference as permission. It's when he takes notice of them that they worry.

Being left to his work isn't the comfort it once was, but he's growing used to it once more. His nightmares do not fade, but the novelty has long since worn off. He drinks himself to sleep, but not so much that he wakes up fuzzy-brained and sick. 

When he wakes up to a familiar sight, he thinks for a moment he's dreaming. 

Corvo is sitting there with his mask off, the heart pulsing away inside his jacket, staring at him. Outsider's eyes, what does the man get out of watching Daud sleep?

They watch each other for a moment, and Daud's cock stirs, but that's simply a fact of the morning. He gets up to piss, and can feel Corvo's eyes on his back the whole time. Something like fear prickles his neck. Corvo might be the only man living who can sneak up on Daud, and the knowledge sets his teeth on edge. When he turns back around he's half expecting to find Corvo right behind him, breathing down his neck. But Corvo is exactly where Daud left him, still watching with his inscrutable expression.

"What do you want, Corvo?" Daud finally snaps.

Corvo licks his lips just briefly, and the lust that stabs through Daud near ruins him. Finally Corvo speaks. "I need your help."

The silence between them only thickens as Daud walks over to Corvo, close enough to touch him. "You need _my_ help, Lord Regent?" Corvo's eyes narrow, but he nods. "With what?"

"There's a ship. The Alba." He swallows, clears his throat. "I need to search it. Quietly. Tonight."

Daud snorts. "Don't you have spies for that?" The silence is his answer, and Daud remembers how angry he is at Corvo for not just doing his job and doing it right. What's the point of being spymaster if you don't have any _spies_? He huffs, but isn't petty enough to tell Corvo to fuck off. "Alright." Corvo stands up, but he lingers, doesn't just transverse away.

It's been a long time, but something bitter twists in his gut when he thinks of saying something, of maybe offering Corvo a drink.

Corvo scrubs a hand over his face, looks a little awkward when he says, "Not night yet."

So he grabs Corvo by the hair and pulls him in. Sooner or later one of the whalers will come by and see them, but Daud finds he can't care about that now. He needs to taste every bit of grime and sweat he can find on Corvo's skin, needs to feel the man bucking against him, needs to hear him groaning and struggling to breathe. Needs him - needs _it_ \- now.

They end up on the floor, fucking into each other's hands, mostly dressed and putting their mouths on every part of skin they can reach. Daud is left with bite marks down his throat and chest, and their mixed seed on his shirt, and the unbearable desire to simply lay back and enjoy the afterglow.

Since there are still hours left before night falls, and they are not young men, Corvo goes back to the palace to do what he must with his time. Idly, Daud imagines him tucking the little empress into bed, but it's probably far too early yet.

(He isn't certain about that. Daud's life hasn't heavily featured bedtimes.) 

Daud spends his time picking a whaler out and briefing him. Thomas would be capable, but Daud's still unsure what to make of the other man's feelings. Bringing him along with Corvo would only complicate things.

Instead he picks Finn. The man's decidedly capable and has all the personality of a river krust. He's not stupid, as far as Daud can tell, but what intelligence he has isn't extended far beyond the reach of his knife. He won't ask questions about the mission or their companion, and he won't gossip.

When it's finally truly dark, and Daud is assured the Whalers won't spiral into chaos for one night without him, he takes Finn and as many clinking vials as they can carry and makes his way to the river. The meeting place is out past Coldridge, where Corvo has arranged a boat and a trusted boatman to take them out to Alba's mooring out at sea.

Corvo is wearing the mask, and no one gives their name as they meet. There's little to be said. Even so, the boatman watches Daud with a steady suspicion. It's nothing new or interesting for Daud. He should never have sat for that portrait, but even if he hadn't, the Whaler and the red coat rather give him away. Being known is an asset to his work, and he can hide if he wishes to. Corvo seems uncomfortable, which is more interesting, though Daud can't be sure if that's due to the presence of the boatman or the Whaler. Perhaps he's just worried about their success this evening, or whatever stakes it has.

He hadn't bothered to ask. Corvo wouldn't have come to him if it weren't important. The sex is good, but he doubts Corvo would put this much effort into an excuse. They've never needed an excuse before now.

Or is it different now that they have spent some time apart?

He was so fucking angry for reasons he can't clearly remember. Angry at Corvo for fucking up the empire, or letting the little girl fuck up the empire, or angry at himself for being angry about it because it's all his fault. Who fucked up that girl, in the end? Who set her little feet on the path to madness and dictatorship and violence-as-power and rule of fear, if not Daud? She struggled in Billie's strong arms, kicking her little feet the air, screaming for her father, while Daud beat her mother back, grabbed her porcelain throat, and pressed a knife through her heart. Daud gave the order to drag her screaming away from the corpse of her mother, and Daud handed her off to the Pendleton twins, and Daud left her city to crumble. 

So he's no right to be angry at Corvo, and Corvo has every right to be angry at him, but instead he yells at Corvo to get that girl under control and they both wish desperately to fuck each other's brains out. Even now, surrounded by the stinking Wrenhaven, with the smell of slaughterhouses and sewerage drifting lazily out to them, he wants Corvo more than he has wanted anyone in his life.

(Corvo could not say the same. That goes without saying. Corvo would do anything, _anything_ , to Daud if it would only erase him and his actions from the past. And Daud would let him. What does that mean? It's more than guilt. The guilt is as vast and dark as the ocean, the guilt is more than he could ever have dreamt, but he feels more than that. He feels-)

The boat stops, as far from the ship as they can be and still transverse to it without getting soaked. It's not safe to stay here long - they'll be spotted. Corvo leads, silent as ever. Then Daud, then Finn, so that all three of them are clinging to the outer hull. The boatman glides away, silent on the water.

They follow Corvo's lead through the deck, avoiding guards easily. They have to jump from deck to deck, but that's nothing. Once, Corvo freezes time, and they drag Finn along with them somewhat sheepishly after remembering too late that Finn is not immune. Daud chokes one guard out, but slides him into a room rather than throws him overboard. Feels another flare of anger, which he should be used to by now. 

When they reach the office on the top deck, Corvo freezes time to speak to him. 

"What are we looking for?" Daud asks, since this will hopefully save Corvo a few words of explanation. 

"Names - Alderdice, Ramsey, Clothilda," Corvo says. Daud recognises them as parliament, but not much else. This is a navy vessel, not a pleasure ship. Something begins to click together, just as Corvo says, “Personal information, groundwork for investments, marriages."

Shared commitments, the consolidation of power. The first overtures of a political faction that doesn't yet wish to show its face.

He wonders that anyone in Dunwall, anyone in the empire, yet believes they can prosper against Corvo. From pauper's son to royal protector, to prisoner, to fugitive, to regent. Even those who don't know his role in events should know better than to set themselves against this man. Daud wouldn't try it, and no one is better prepared than him. They fire a volley of sleep darts through the room, and the moment time resumes the men drop to the floor unconscious. "Keep watch," Daud orders Finn.

"Yes master," Finn says, and disappears.

Corvo's wearing his mask, but there's something of humour in the tilt of his head. "I didn't order them to call me that," he snaps. They call him whatever they wish to, as long as they do it with respect. Billie had been the first to call him Daud, when her awe of him had first been overtaken by her ego. The others use his name but rarely.

He stops thinking about Billie, and re-reads the papers he'd been blindly staring at.

_He dreams of simpler times."_

Daud feels his knife in his hand and the white blind rage of it before he thinks anything. He's ready to kill her again-

and that is the thought that stops him, only an inch from Corvo's hand and the cursed thing.

This might be the first time he's had the advantage on Corvo, and he doesn't care to use it. He doesn't even want to hurt the man, just get rid of him. Get rid of _it_.

Moving like his bones are ice, he lowers his sword, sheaths it again. "Don't," is all he can manage to say. He doesn't have the right to deny Corvo anything, and this is no more than he deserves, but he can't live with this. He doesn’t have an alternative, if Corvo persists.

"When we fought," Corvo says, his voice rough, and Daud shoves him to the wall. Slams him into it so hard the window rattles. He doesn't have anything to say, but he can't have this conversation. "The overseers-"

Daud presses his forearm into Corvo's throat, staring into the mask's empty eyes. But when he tries to form some threat or plea he finds there's nothing he can say. Not to Corvo. Lost for alternatives, he pulls down the collar of Corvo's coat and bites his throat, sucks into the skin until Corvo gasps above him. 

In the corner of his eye he can still hear the heart, it's dull beating. He presses his thigh between Corvo's, hard enough to hurt, and does his best to draw blood from Corvo's shoulder. All he can hear is the roaring in his ears, and Corvo's hands are strong on his arms, digging in viciously. The taste of blood explodes in Daud's mouth and he feels more than hears Corvo's groan.

He's thrown to the ground, Corvo pinning his shoulders down, and he fights back instinctively. Brings his thigh up and uses the arm trapped between them to twist back Corvo's thumb to the edge of breaking point. 

Both of them stop, and slowly let go. Corvo stands, retreats, picks up the dropped heart. 

Daud sits up, still panting, and he feels sick but at least he feels something. However long that took, he felt nothing.

"You know me," Corvo rasps, into the dead silence of the room. "You said you didn't, but you do. You killed my-" a loud breath where a word should be. "You know the only thing that matters. I know nothing about you."

 _Why would you care_ , Daud wants to ask, but he doesn't. If for no other reason, he'd want to level the playing field. And pretend as he might, he can't say they're strangers to each other. They are connected: were connected the moment he pushed his knife into Jessamine Kaldwin's gentle heart.

"I'm from Serkonos," he says, because it's the only thing he can stand to say. "I found most of the whalers as children. Some not much older than our empress." He _can't_ talk about Billie, or the overseers, or the assassination. "I've been marked for seventeen years." He stands up and looks at the table, and goes back to his search for the relevant information. Nothing more. It's more than he's ever told anyone.

Corvo doesn't thank him, because that would be intolerable. Instead he tucks the heart away, and does what they came here to do. They take a selection of papers, being careful not to disturb too much. They take some other notes as distraction. It will take some time for the men involved to know what has been stolen. Though they might guess, they won't know who took it. 

When they've searched the room and the adjoining office - already empty of men - Daud hands his papers to Corvo. He's already learned more than enough to put things together. Corvo looks at collection of papers, his expression still hidden by the mask, before he tucks them away. His shoulders are slumped with weariness.

The job of regent alone is immense. Corvo has an empire to rule, none of the usual training, and no advisers he trusted - all while trying to raise a clever, angry, wilful child. To have to also be his own spymaster was plainly impossible, Outsider-given gifts or no, but what else could he do? He could scarcely trust anyone else to the position after the actions of the last spymaster.

"What are you going to do with it?" he asks. Maybe there's some way he can help. Corvo has rare skill, but Daud has experience. He knows the sewers and rooftops like a map, and he knows the bolt-holes of many a fugitive and businessman. If Dunwall is a tangled web of deceit, Daud is the spider feeling every vibration run along its secret silken threads.

Corvo looks at the bundle of papers like he can read some code hidden there, and then slowly turns his attention back to Daud. He may as well wear the mask even when it's off. The only time Daud sees past the surface of him is when they're fucking. "Nothing, for now." A breath of silence, tension beginning to rise between them like a dark tide. "Why this?" He gestures with his empty hand to the room behind them, the bodies slumped on every surface.

Because the man who took him - Silvio, his dark eyes, his calm voice - told him he'd be more than a pickpocket one day, though he doesn't think this is what Silvio had in mind. Because he hadn't been able to think of any reason to look for his mother, even if he stood a chance of finding her. Because he was good at it, born for it, raised for it, with speed and ruthlessness admired by everyone - admired by the void itself. Because he was more than a man and was born knowing it.

He thinks about telling this to Corvo - Corvo who did all that he did for love _,_ of all things:  _love_  - and it burns in his throat like smoke. So instead he says "Because I could," and turns away. As he reaches for the door, Corvo's hand clamps down on his arm, holds him where he is.

Daud can hear the roaring waves beating on the hull of the ship, the shifting ground beneath them, the wild storm of his rising blood as he turns like a wolfhound prowling to meet the mask's empty eyes. "If you hadn't been taken-" Corvo begins, but that is _enough._  

"How many times do I have to tell you," he snarls, feels the tightening grip on his arm, feels the room shrink down too small and close around them, "not to use that thing on me?" Corvo chooses now of all times to be silent. Daud wrenches the mask off, throws it behind him, and pushes Corvo back into the wall. Their hips and thighs grind together, Daud's left arm is going numb beneath Corvo's grip, and this time when he presses his arm to Corvo's throat he has the knife close by. "I'm not keeping any secrets, Corvo, and if you want to torture me you have better ways."

Apparently Corvo takes this as an invitation, because the next thing he knows is Corvo's teeth on his lips, tearing into Daud like carrion. 

This is the wrong place, wrong time, but they are the wrong people, so it only spurs them on. Daud yanks his arm out of Corvo's grip - blood rushing stinging back into numb fingertips - and works his hand beneath Corvo's layers. Belts shoved up, fumbling with the buckle of his pants, and then there is hot skin and coarse hair against his fingers. The sounds Corvo's making are tiny, rough things, as much felt as heard, and Daud's mind is a white roar of sound. 

He wraps his fingers around Corvo's half-hard cock, keeps it rough and fast as he works him to hardness. Their faces are pressed so hard together he can feel their bones bruising.

Corvo's hand wraps hard around Daud's jaw, so hard Daud's teeth scrape into his cheek, as if his mouth needed prying open.

It has been so long. It has been only weeks. Forty days and forty nights he has held back the dam as it groaned beneath the weight of this torrential need. He wants Corvo's blood in his mouth. He wants to bury his face in Corvo's chest and come out red with gore. Outsider - he just wants to fuck the life out of both of them, just stay locked together until their bodies wear away to nothing.

Between sweat and precome, Corvo's cock gets slicker and slicker between them. Corvo's hips buck, and Daud can feel the moans muffled by his ulna crushing Corvo's throat. His anger is long forgotten. He doesn't know if Corvo was ever angry to begin with. Doesn't know anything about what goes on behind those eyes. "You could have just asked for this," he growls against Corvo's cheek. The stubble there scratches his skin.

The hand Corvo doesn't have clawing at Daud's face pulls him in even closer, so close Daud can barely move his hand on Corvo's cock, but it doesn't seem to be a problem. His nails dig into Daud's back, his breaths come in grating bone-saw rasps and it won't be much longer. 

Daud pulls his head back an inch, just to fix his eyes on Corvo's mouth. His whole face is flushed red, his lips most of all, and spit he can't swallow is running down the side of his chin. "When this is done," he says, dragging his thumb over the wet head of Corvo's cock, "I'm going to fuck your mouth." He takes his arm off Corvo's throat, to press two fingers down on his tongue, and Corvo's teeth snap down on him. Hot come spills over Daud's hand and Corvo snaps forward around Daud's body, tight and close and desperate.

Pain flares up Daud's arm, hurting like Corvo might actually bite through the bone, and if he had a free hand he'd get himself off then and there. The way Corvo is buried in him is heresy. There isn't room for light to pass between them, if there was any light in this place to begin with. He works every last drop out of Corvo's cock, so hard it must hurt, his own hips grinding helplessly.

Corvo goes to his knees of his own accord, cornered between Daud's hips and the wall, lets Daud's fingers slip from his mouth on the way down. The skin is red and darkening, will bruise in the shape of Corvo's teeth, and he keeps that thought in mind as he threads that same hand into Corvo's long hair and pulls tight.

They work together to free Daud's cock from his pants, and then those dark eyes stare up at him, hinting at something that might be called playful, before his mouth sinks down. The hoarse "Fuck" escapes Daud's mouth on its own.

He slides his other hand to Corvo's face, thumbs along his sticky open lips, smears more spit across his skin. Then buries that hand too in Corvo's thick hair, grips it painfully and tries a shallow thrust into Corvo's throat. Corvo chokes, but he doesn't pull away. His next breath is so deep Daud can feel it, and feels Corvo choke again as he forces himself down on Daud's cock. 

Even the automatic shallow thrusts of Daud's hips feel like too much. He bites his lip, smacks his head against the wall, does his best not to force himself any deeper in Corvo's tight throat. 

There's a noise - any of the countless noises of a working ship - and Daud remembers the whole world at once. He remembers the unlocked door, the patrolling guards, the unconscious bodies, the waiting boatman, and Finn keeping watch. Finn maybe using void gaze to be sure he isn't surprised, and staring at this room where their bodies might as well spell it out. 

Alternatively, Finn might not use void gaze at all. He might transverse right into the room, to warn them silently if he sees something coming, and stumble across this scene. Corvo's unmasked face, and Daud fucking his throat. Alternatively —

"I could summon my men," he says. It might sound like a non sequitur, though he can't from here judge Corvo's reaction. "I wonder what they would think, seeing this. Our Lord Regent, choking on my cock."

That makes Corvo groan, and then choke, pulling back as he coughs. He looks up at Daud with spit trailing down his swollen lips, expression unreadable, then lowers his head again. His throat just slides over Daud's cock like it had never left, and then he is still.

Waiting.

Inviting.

Daud clenches his hands in Corvo's hair and gives one lazy thrust, testing the waters, before he holds Corvo in place with a painful grip and proceeds in earnest. Corvo's voice might be gone for good after this, but it will have been worth it. 

There's a knock on the door, and he comes. 

He is helpless in that moment, pleasure beating him down like a crashing wave. If this is how he dies, he's luckier than he has any right to be.

Corvo stands up, looking shockingly put together, and leaves Daud propped up against the wall. Daud just about has the presence of mind to tuck his cock away and stand up straight before Corvo opens the door. 

Finn enters, and if he's seen anything it doesn't shock him enough to carry across that nebulous connection Daud can feel. "Sir. It seems they've noticed something amiss. Guards are coming." 

Corvo's masked face turns to Daud, a look unseen but somehow meaningful. He doesn't need to be told. "We've got what we came for," Daud says. "Return to the boat." All three of them transverse back to cling at the hull. The grey waves spray up around them, drops sliding down dark leather, as they wait. Corvo raises his fist, flashes a void-blue light for a moment, and then covers it again. With void gaze, Daud can see the boat moving towards them.

Something dark moves in the water below them, and Daud stares down at it. It couldn't be too much smaller than the ship, if he knows anything about whales. But he can see it clear as day, through all the water that lies between them, its yellow silhouette deep below them in the water.

The lighthouse is bright and clear on Kingsparrow Island, giving the illusion that they are not adrift in an infinity of cold water. They were much further out to sea than he'd really thought about, and the water is so deep. He can hear the void intruding on the world here, its whispers all but forming words. It's the sound he hears in dreams, inasmuch as he has any dreams that aren't the same few words chanted over and over.

Void gaze flickers out, and he is once more only staring at the black sea. The waves are too choppy and the smog from Dunwall too thick for any reflection of stars, and even the moon is only a weak light.

The boatman pulls into acceptable distance as the sounds of alarm start to carry down to them. Daud pushes off the hull and into the air, reaching out with one hand for the space above the boat. He pulls it towards him, and lands on his feet in the rocking boat. For a second it is just the two of them the small space, and the boatman stares up at him. If Daud had to name the expression on his face, he'd be torn between judgement and regret.

Corvo and Finn land heavy, and the three settle down for the journey back. Daud sits across from the boatman, watches him as they make their journey. He knows who Corvo is, no doubt about that, and he knows who Daud is. He must recognise the masked Whaler as one of Daud's men, though few outside their ranks could tell any of them apart from another, and this man is not among them.

If he knows Corvo is the masked assassin, he must have known him when he did his dark work. Not that any information the man has would likely prove useful: those involved are mostly dead as far as Daud's sources can tell. There were many dead. Did he know Corvo from Before? What did he think of Corvo's work? What does he think now?

Daud muses over it in silence, his gaze drifting only occasionally to Corvo. The mask's sharp lines are picked out in moonlight, and Daud would rather see his face.

They pull in towards the shore not far from the Tower, and Corvo steps out into the water directly, wading to shore. Daud stands, and both men look at him. "You can go home," he tells Finn. He resists the urge to make excuses, to say he has unfinished business. His business with Corvo is his own.

"Master." Finn disappears, to find his own way back across the river. Daud nods once at the boatman, then transverses to the bank.

Corvo looks at him with what Daud might imagine is surprise, though he can't see anything past the mask. "Unless you have other business?" Daud asks, quiet enough that the boatman shouldn't hear them.

He holds the mask's gaze, and then Corvo raises a hand, takes the mask off. "I hoped we would be back before bedtime," he says, with an edge of tired humour. Then he reaches into his coat and pulls out the papers. "If you take this to the safe room..." he trails off, but still holds the papers out. 

Daud takes them, tucks them safely away. It seems very late for a young lady to still be up, but that's no reason for Corvo not to visit her. Apparently he's quite fond of watching people sleep. 

(For a moment his mind recoils from the comparison between him and the empress. Whatever he and Corvo has, it does not extend to her.)

They transverse up to the nearest roof, and each make their silent way to the tower. It is not a race, but Daud wins.


End file.
